Energy, exergy, economic, and life cycle environmental analysis of a novel biogas-fueled solid oxide fuel cell hybrid power generation system assisted with solar thermal energy storage unit

Biogas production and its derived hydrogen production technology have broad application prospects. In this paper, an integrated biogas power generation system with solid oxide fuel cells is proposed, which mainly consists of four units: a solar thermal energy storage unit, a biogas production and hydrogen generation unit, a SOFC-MGT unit, and a waste heat utilization unit. The presented system is first studied using energy, exergy, economic, and life cycle environmental analyses and the survey results are contrasted with those of renewable energy systems discussed in the references. Besides, a parametric study is conducted to explore the effect of thermodynamic parameters of solar irradiance, ambient temperature, work fluid temperature, reforming temperature, inlet H2O/CH4 ratio of the reformer, and the current density of SOFC. Results indicate that the proposed system's energy efficiency, exergy efficiency, electric power output and exergy destruction are 43.29%, 37.4%, 414.16 kW (net power generation is 351.43 kW) and 1434.59 kW, respectivily. Moreover, the system's levelized cost of electricity and carbon emission factor are $0.076/kWh and 335.6gCO2eq/kWh, having good economic and environmental benefits simultaneously. The parametric study shows that PTSC can be designed shorter with more solar irradiance and high ambient temperature. Besides, the increase of inlet H2O/CH4 ratio and reforming temperature make the system's energy efficiency fall by 2.5% and 20%. For every 300 A/m2 increase in the current density of SOFC, the system efficiency rises by 1.01%.